Field of the Invention
The invention generally relates to the coordination of operations between communication services, and more particularly, to the coordination of the operations between CS and PS services with different subscriber identity cards.
Description of the Related Art
With growing demand for ubiquitous computing and networking, various wireless communication technologies have been developed, such as the Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) technology, General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) technology, Enhanced Data rates for Global Evolution (EDGE) technology, Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (W-CDMA) technology, Code Division Multiple Access 2000 (CDMA 2000) technology, Time Division-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD-SCDMA) technology, Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) technology, Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology, Time-Division LTE (TD-LTE) technology, and others. Generally, a cellular phone only supports one wireless communication technology and provides the user the flexibility of mobile communications at all times via the supported wireless communication technology, regardless of his/her geographic location. Especially in today's business world, a cellular phone is becoming a necessary business tool for conducting business conveniently. For business people, having an additional cellular phone exclusive for business matters is a common choice, since they need to conduct business while out of the office or even out of the city/country. Others may find having an additional cellular phone is a good way to save/control the budget for wireless service charges (including phone services and/or data services). However, having two or more than two cellular phones may be troublesome when one has to switch frequently between the cellular phones and carry around all the cellular phones with himself/herself. In order to provide a convenient way of having multiple subscriber numbers, dual-card cellular phones have been developed, which generally have two wireless communications modules for respectively performing wireless transmission and reception with an individual subscriber number. The dual-card design allows both wireless communications modules to be active simultaneously and allows calls to be received on either subscriber numbers associated with one of the wireless communications modules at any time. Thus, a dual-card cellular phone may be used for business and personal use with separate subscriber numbers and bills, or for travel with the second subscriber number for the country visited.
For the dual-card cellular phones with one single transceiver, only one wireless communications module is allowed to obtain network resources using the single transceiver, while the other wireless communications module has no control over the single transceiver. Specially, the wireless communications module with no control over the single transceiver is not aware that the single transceiver is occupied by the other wireless communications module, because the two wireless communications modules operate independently and lack a proper communication mechanism there-between. For example, a dual-card cellular phone may be configured such that the single transceiver is occupied by the first wireless communications module for performing a data service, e.g. the Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS). When a Mobile Originated (MO) call for the second wireless communications module is requested by a user, an error message, such as “Network Failed”, may be shown on the screen of the dual-card cellular phone since the second wireless communications module has no access to the single transceiver, nor has shown information about the statuses of the first wireless communications module and the single transceiver.
Therefore, it is desirable to have a flexible way of managing the operations between the multiple wireless communications modules for multiple subscriber identity cards, so that the operations of the multiple wireless communications modules may be coordinated to respond to users' MO requests.